RADIATIVE TRANSFER IN A SCATTERING SPHERICAL ATMOSPHERE

We have written a code called QDM_sca, which numerically solves the problem of radiative transfer in an anisotropically scattering, spherical atmosphere. First we formulate the problem as a second order differential equation of a quasi-diffusion type. We then apply a three-point finite differencing to the resulting differential equation and transform it to a tri-diagonal system of simultaneous linear equations. After boundary conditions are implemented in the tri-diagonal system, the QDM_sca radiative code fixes the field of specific intensity at every point in the atmosphere. As an application example, we used the code to calculate the brightness of atmospheric diffuse light(ADL) as a function of zenith distance, which plays a pivotal role in reducing the zodiacal light brightness from night sky observations. On the basis of this ADL calculation, frequent uses of effective extinction optical depth have been fully justified in correcting the atmospheric extinction for such extended sources as zodiacal light, integrated starlight and diffuse galactic light. The code will be available on request.